You can’t close if you can’t open. That’s it. No client, no listing, no deal. You have to start the game. If you can’t land a client or a listing, go home. Your mission, your only mission, is to sell a property to or for someone.

There are as many ways and places to open as there are people. As you become established in a market, opens come from all directions. I’ve opened deals in grocery stores, hot tubs, taco truck lines, the gym, pools, restaurants, charity events, concerts, the veterinarian’s waiting room, baseball and football games, and even – sometimes – my office. Keep in mind that where there are humans, there is the opportunity for business.

The Altman Brothers have huge reach because we have to; our market demands it. People from all over the world work and invest in Los Angeles. I search for buyers and sellers at the top of the financial food chain – Asia, Europe, the Middle East. Celebrities fly in at all hours of the night, looking for exclusive showings before the sun rises. My product is hyper-local but my clients require me to think like a globalist. That means information about world markets. That means the internet. That means messages have to resonate in Southern California as well as the rest of the world; our listings are translated into 20 languages. We open everywhere. We close in LA.

So how do you find real-live clients to open? We’re not there yet. Calm down and listen.

If you’re in the beginning stages of your career, I suggest you do what I did: Sit at other agents’ open houses. That’s how I snagged 6 of my first 10 deals. Potential buyers who want those homes are fair game for anything you might offer them. Engage. Ask pointed questions about what they want and go find it for them. But you’re still not there, not yet. Let’s look at how much you really have to offer.

The ocean is a lot bigger than you think. To be truly prepared for your catch, you need to search under every rock. Not for the client, but to get a feel for the territory first.

Know More than the ’Hood

If you meet someone and they express interest in a particular neighborhood, you’ll need to draw on what you know is available. You need to be sharp, quick, ready, always something more to show. You have to flood your client with options ready to spit at them. “Don’t like this one? Check out that one! Not for you? How about this? Have you ever considered . . . ?”

You must be ready to sell real estate 24/7, know your market inside and out, and keep studying. “Your husband loves art deco, but you want Spanish tile? Here is three of each with something in between. Oh, you’re pregnant? These five offer outdoor spaces with an extra bedroom in a great school zone, the neighborhood up and coming.” Patrol the waters, have an ear to the street. A jackhammer sounds around the corner. You check it out. A coffee shop opens in the hood? Circle the block. You need to be a property stalker.

If you see a guy in a $3,000 suit jumping out of a bush in the Hollywood Hills, it’s probably me. I’m a self-admitted property stalker and I make it a habit to learn about a new neighborhood, a few blocks, or even a specific property, every week.

Through my Dream Team title agent I can find all the information I need: Has the house has been on the market for three months with no sale? Odds are the listing agreement is about to change. I need to know that if I’m going to represent a buyer or a seller. It’s a whole lot easier to negotiate a lower price if you know no one is beating down the door.

Properties that haven’t been on the market for decades can make awesome deals. Unless it’s a castle in Europe, most houses don’t stay in the family. I keep my eye on these properties because when they hit, vultures circle and I drive up the price. If I get to it first with one of my strategic alliances, we can redo the property and make a profit.

I have a house in Beverly Hills right now that’s been in escrow for a year, waiting out the lifetime of the elderly owners. I know, it sounds creepy, but it’s not. It’s business. It’s reality. If you haven’t heard, life will kill you. I’m just being aware and doing the math. I’m giving myself options. In a seller’s market, if you see a listing on the market past 120 days, a change in real estate agents may be coming. More math, more options. Be aware and you’ll bring your clients what they never saw for themselves. You’ll make money.

That said, just like property owners, cities are constantly changing and you have to be ahead of them. You have to be aware all of the time. You have to predict. You have to see the trends. You have to open and close. You have to be a fortuneteller: There are signs everywhere to make you look more psychic than you actually are.

Real estate agents can lose sight of the transformative effect they have on their town or city. You’re making and remaking neighborhoods by the simple fact of who is buying and selling. I am literally changing Los Angeles and the world one property at a time.

Bringing in higher income, educated buyers to marginal neighborhoods filled with “fixer uppers” is the very definition of gentrification, and it’s driven by buyers, sellers, developers – and their real estate agents. Driven by me – and driven by you if you’re good enough.

San Diego and Philadelphia currently lead the way with gentrification in America. That’s how real estate agents change cities. Governing magazine said that in Philadelphia from 1980 to 2000, only 1.5% of the city’s poorest neighborhoods were upgrading. By 2018, 28% were gentrifying. Do the math: That’s a jump of 1,800% for Philly, and only San Diego registers higher. Communities rise from the ashes because of you and me.

At the end of the day, I used to drive home to the Bird Streets in the Hills. Construction equipment made the trip slow as hell. I’d bitch a lot. One day my wife Heather said, “You did all this. These trucks are here because of you. Stop bitching about traffic. You created it.”

She’s right. If we’re doing our jobs correctly, the landscape is always changing. It was the first time I had a true sense of how the Altman Brothers shape Los Angeles. Because it was my hood, I knew all the moves already and forgot how much of it was my doing. The trick is to notice in the other communities where you’re not already killing it. Pay attention. You need the vision ready to sell your client even before you have the chance to open them.

Speculation about “the next hot neighborhood” is endless in real estate and hugely useful to younger buyers looking for their first “starter” home. Real estate agents in search of new worlds to conquer or young agents who want to begin building a career are great neighborhood builders. If you have strong developer relationships, you’ll hear about up-and-coming neighborhoods, the “under-stored” areas where they see “green shoots” of growth indicating something new is taking hold.

In Park Slope, Brooklyn, 20 years ago, that green shoot was Connecticut Muffin, a coffee shop with a suburban clientele. In their quest to identify new markets for hot drinks and baked goods, Connecticut Muffin found a home among some “nesters” in New York City, young growing families that had flocked to the area, driving prices into the multiple millions for a simple brownstone.

Today, celebrities such as Michelle Williams and Anne Hathaway have houses there, and Matt Damon just bought what may be the priciest piece of private real estate in Brooklyn’s history, a penthouse just shy of $17 million. The real estate agents and developers who brought Park Slope into the twenty-first century are the best people to get you into that community; they know it, hell they built it, and they’ve heavily networked it.

After living and selling the Bird Streets in L.A., little goes on there that I don’t know about. As the Bird Streets rose, I did too. It’s the same in Park Slope. Understand what’s hot and what’s not. Use your expertise to gauge real estate on the rise and on the fall; that’s part of your reputation building and market understanding.

Read local business news to anticipate ways that your town and neighboring communities will change. Watch major commercial players and see what they do. When Google moved into Venice Beach in Los Angeles, it was obvious what would happen. Jim Morrison once squatted tripping on acid where some of the priciest real estate in the land now exists.

If you get the signs right, if you can read the up-and-coming locations surrounding the community you are already serving, you will make money. Use this talent as part of your stats. Put it in your bio – fortuneteller!

When Matt and I started out, we were flipping houses in Silver Lake, Los Angeles. It was filthy and full of gangs, but we saw the signs. We saw the artists, the new cafés. Now it’s high-priced, super trendy, and full of young movie stars. We were in Silver Lake because that’s what we could afford. We rose with the neighborhood and were able to offer the area to others who couldn’t see the upswing. It worked.

Imagine if a few years ago you had early insider information that the St. Louis Rams were moving to Inglewood, Los Angeles, a neighborhood once full of racial tensions. You’d be killing it right now. The new NFL stadium will be ready in 2020 and real estate prices are off the charts. Now, with the new stadium, here come the Olympics, the World Cup. Here comes money. If you own there, life looks good about now. If you’re an agent selling it, congrats, but watch your back. The Altman Brothers are just up the 405.

Watch Your Back

There are a million ways to screw up an open. I see agents do it every day. In fact, I rely on agents who blow their opens. It’s part of my strategy. I look for their flaws, their weaknesses, their misses, and I strike. From the clients’ point of view, when I roll in with my stats and point out what their agent is doing wrong even before they’ve done anything, it’s very hard for them not to want to lay down with me. I bank on it. It works.

Mess up? Lose the client. Someone like me will get them next.

Don’t land them immediately and hold on tight? Lose the client and again, someone like me will get them next. It’s that simple.

The Altman Brothers feel quite comfortable allowing our clients to stroll properties by their lonesome, but I don’t suggest you allow this yourself. It’s blood in the water, man, and I can taste it. The entire world is waiting to be opened and I’m ready to close ’em. You need to be, too.

A few words about “guarantees” in real estate, so don’t say I didn’t warn you.

There is no “given” when representing a buyer. A buyer’s agreement has been obsolete for years in my market. Never forget that a buyer works on a moment-to-moment lease breakable at any time by either party. It’s not unlike dating.

You have to win the person over, prove yourself every time before someone else comes sniffing, making false promises, looking for their in. Buyers are free to leave at anytime. So, you have to make sure they know there is no reason to be with anyone else in the room but you.

The only “official” open is the seller’s agreement. With the seller, well that’s marriage, baby. There are legal ramifications if you split. There’s lots of drama with buyers and sellers alike, but there can be a lot of lovin’ as well.

Networking and Giving to Get

Take the largest industry in your area – for us in Los Angeles, that’s entertainment – and do your best to network it. If the biggest employer in your town is the hospital system, for instance, go see employee services and introduce yourself.

Look for places where people in transition hang – I’m talking the big events here: birth, marriage, divorce and death – and meet them. These pivotal life moments often require new living space. Talk to wedding planners and wedding dress boutiques, divorce attorneys, jewelers, obstetricians, probate and estate lawyers, and liquidators.

When Heather was pregnant with Alexis, Lamaze class was a great place to open. When Alexis was born we moved out of the Hollywood Hills. I was ripe for what a good real estate agent would describe as the “open” of life transitions.

As far as your own community, I can guarantee you that you’re not working it enough. Dirty up to help clean and dig in. Google national and hyper-local social activism groups and business development organizations. Find out who is doing what charity and where. Join. Be part of what you sell – the community.

Matt and I have done a lot of volunteer work over the years and one of our all time favorites is pet adoption. I also got involved with the Wounded Warrior Project through a friend and client, Mark Wahlberg, and it brought a cool new dimension to my life. These projects are personally satisfying in the moment and professionally valuable for the future.

You want a good laugh? Watch the rap video I Sell the Dream on YouTube. I’m like the Drake of real estate, and all proceeds went to the organization.

Form your own group of “leaders” who get together regularly to discuss anything from neighborhood development to football. The point is to gather, network, let everyone know you sell real estate, and you have a property in mind for them when they’re ready to discuss it.

These charity group “leaders” can also provide you with ever-important real estate gossip. As a city, town, or neighborhood changes and evolves, your group may know it before it hits the street because, in real estate, if you read it in the paper, it’s too late. Information is gold. Information is power. Information is the open, the work, and the close.

Now that I have a baby girl, I can see how networking opportunities will arise at future events: peewee soccer, parents’ night at school, ballet classes, play dates, and family barbecues. My life will be filled with people who have children and in real estate, children means growth.

Growth means upgrade; upgrade means a new house. You can be the guy who upgrades all. That’s the main element of being “baller.” offering people the possibility of improvement. We are “middlemen” in more ways than one. Need a bigger house in a better neighborhood? I can make that happen.

One Saturday afternoon, I had a listing appointment, a big one, for a potential client who wanted over $50 million for his estate. I left the meeting and was wandering the aisles of Ralph’s grocery store in my pricey suit, looking ridiculous among shoppers wearing the yoga pants, and gathering items from my wife’s list. I leaned into the cold case to grab the frozen chicken nuggets – you parents of toddlers know what I’m talking about – and I heard someone call my name.

An old client stood behind me, three tiny kids filling her shopping cart. When I found her first condo years prior, she was still single. Now, her husband was a rising star at one of the studios, and they were thinking about a home upgrade. Their number of children demanded it.

Within days, I had her completely in love with a five-bedroom in Manhattan Beach, one of the strong school districts in Los Angeles’s South Bay. This place was on the edge of a park and had a huge backyard, especially for that part of town. The outdoor space was money – pool, firepit, and built-in seating. It was perfect for entertaining her husband’s new industry colleagues and all for around $5.3 million.

I passed them the keys two weeks later, all because I bumped into an old client in the grocery store and asked, “Where you living these days?” I opened. I opened ready to close. I asked questions. I engaged. I began the deal.

I don’t sit in my office to work: I go to the Beverly Hills Starbucks and hand my card to people I talk to in line. I say, “I’m Josh Altman. It was great talking to you, man, and if you or your friends ever have questions about real estate, hit me up.” I offer to answer questions about real estate, not sell a house, because when I open, I give to get.

Giving to get makes money. The ancient Babylonians knew that when they wrote the Code of Hammurabi, and believe it or not, some 4,000 years later, there’s a science to back this up.

Robert Cialdini, a professor emeritus of marketing and psychology at Arizona State University, explains the reasoning behind why people say “yes” his classic book Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. If you haven’t read it, do. It makes sense, and the theory makes money. Remember, we’re here to make money, so listen up!

Cialdini isolated six points that work – whether consciously or unconsciously – to shape decisions. The first one is reciprocity. To prove this, Cialdini created a simple experiment in a restaurant to determine if the gift of a mint would increase tips.

Servers who left a mint with the check saw an uptick of 3% in what customers left them. When the servers said, “Here are two mints for you,” the tip didn’t double, it quadrupled. The next round of the experiment had the servers put down two mints, walk away from the table, stop, return and say, “For you nice people, here are three mints.” Tips were off the charts, coming in at an average of 23% higher.

That’s why you should always offer help, advice, kindness, and respect; it’s an open, maybe a bit slower than a buyer on the line, but it’s an open nevertheless. It’s “giving to get,” and “giving to get” makes money. Open. Work. Close. Make money. Got it? Get it? Good.